Cast your minds back about 2 and a half years. That’s how long I’ve been writing this blog. Well it may not be quite that long but it certainly seems longer at times. Especially those periods of creative drought, a feature which has occurred more to me lately than the number of times the sun has shone over MediocreBritain*.
Anyway, the blog was started as a means of filling in the large amounts of time given to me by The Sandman after he had kindly moved me into a Change Management role for The Company. During the following 2 or so years the role developed into a Team Management one, incorporating Process Modelling and mapping, Change Management, System Tools and Planning. All in all a cushy number, but not one that challenged me overtly. See…I’m yawning now just writing it…and you’re probably yawning now just reading it. Despite my best efforts to gain a job elsewhere it seemed I was stuck firmly in the Land Of The Middle Manager earning a good salary, with good benefits for doing comparatively fuck all. Safe, secure but ultimately mind numbingly dull would describe it best. I couldn’t carry on with this because I need more to challenge me, or else the creativity just drops away as brain cells die off due to lack of use and redundancy.
Then came an “initiative” at work to “raise the bar” on Change Management….all of which seemed geared to my ITIL manager qualifications and sponsored by The Beach Babe herself. I’m not inspired by many Managers, but The Beach Babe…an iron fist in a velvet glove…. is certainly someone special. She knows my name, my football team and the fact that I have a gob full of metal straightening my tombstone like teeth. And that’s a real change. A real personal touch is such a welcome change in this increasingly bland Corporate head-giving environment. So, I decide to pitch directly to her for a role running Change Management across the whole of the “networky” bit of The Company’s High Tech Pipes, Tubes and Strings department. The Schoolteacher did not like this one bit and saw this as a breach of protocol, but The Beach Babe replied warmly and genuinely and referred me to the person setting up this role and to whom I would be reporting , a guy I will simply call The Bristolian. The Bristolian talks in a really strong Bristol accent and always dresses in a t-shirt and combats with trainers. Not your normal Senior Manager by a long shot. I arranged to talk and meet with him…..but weeks previously to this, when The Shepherd was still in place (prior to his unceremonious ejection by The Beach Babe) I had applied for another job within The Company in the “servicey” side of The Company’s High Tech Pipes, Tubes and Strings department. Out of the blue a few weeks ago I was asked for an interview and attended last week for the role of Service Reporting Manager – a quite customer facing role, one level up from where I am now, with a demanding and driven but clear manager and a brand new team in an area I know very little about!
Hmmmm…but what about the role with The Bristolian. Well, unbeknownst to me he had decided to place it within one of his existing teams meaning that if I was given the role or won it I would be on the same level as I am now with no gain, except perhaps the chance to shine in a slightly different role with a slightly farther ranging remit. But there were no guarantees the role would be mine, even if they were allowed to map me into it, the chances are HR would force them into advertising it internally and then I’m up against others…and well who knows….someone might come along and blow me out of the water. I just don’t trust my luck enough to take a gamble on a role that is only “proposed” at the moment.
Well, you guessed it….. I actually got offered the other role and since Wednesday of last week have been in the allegedly “nice” dilemma over being wanted for 2 roles. For me it wasn’t “nice”…a dilemma is a dilemma, full stop. After a lot of soul searching, talking with GMD and others I respect…including my old cohort Private Godfrey I was still unsure…but of all people The Schoolteacher gave me the one question to tip the balance. He said “how much do you want to be pigeonholed in Change management?” For the whole weekend I’ve thought about how the strange and unknown role would benefit me, and how the one I pitched at The Beach Babe for would show my strengths and increase the breadth of my knowledge and experience and The Schoolteachers one piercing question, one simple pointed question that revealed new layers of doubt and ambition was the one that tipped the balance.
Today I have become restless, daring and risky…. I’ve held my breath and jumped off the precipice for a base jump of unknown proportions….I’ve shoved my head over the parapet without a tin hat….thrown the dice and accepted the role with the “servicey” side of The Company’s High Tech Pipes, Tubes and Strings department. I will pitch for a pay rise although as its up 1 level but within the same pay band this is a long shot.
I wonder if I can still cut it? Time to find out………
Later GrocerButcherBakerCandleStickMakerJack
*Great to see a stunning year for the English/British in sports though isn’t it? Dismal performances by England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland in Rugby Union, by MediocreBritain in Rugby league, the rubbish served upon us by the English cricket team, the pile of steaming turd that was the England football team during the World Cup, the turgid Tim Henman pumping his weedy little fist at Wimbledon, Andy Murray whinging about his growing pains and now the golfers failing to put on a single challenge to American domination at The Open.
Land of Hope and Glory? Land of Dope and Moron more like.
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